Technological Field
The described technology generally relates to a method for managing messages exchanged between an aircraft piloted by at least one pilot, and a ground station.
The described technology also generally relates to an electronic device for managing exchanged messages.
Description of the Related Technology
“Ground station” refers to an air traffic control center above a predetermined geographical zone or any other station intended to control or at least observe the aircraft in such a zone.
“Aircraft” refers to a moving vehicle piloted by at least one pilot, and in particular able to fly in the Earth's atmosphere, such as an airplane, a drone or a helicopter.
“Pilot” refers to a person piloting the aircraft from a cockpit situated in the aircraft or at a distance therefrom.
In general, such an aircraft is able to fly in the Earth's atmosphere under the control of at least one ground station. This control is done as a function of the air traffic in the vicinity of the aircraft and in particular makes it possible to optimize this traffic and avoid collisions.
Different communication channels enabling communication between the pilot of the aircraft and the ground station exist in the related technology.
Among these channels, voice communication between the pilot and ground station through radio communication devices plays an important role. However, this communication channel is not always accessible throughout the entire flight of the aircraft and may sometimes lead to an erroneous interpretation of the information sent orally by one or the other party.
Thus, aside from voice communication, it is known to use a textual communication channel allowing the exchange of text messages between the pilot of the aircraft and the ground station. This communication channel is known in the state of the art under the term “Data Link” and corresponds to layer 2 of the open systems interconnection (OSI) model according to standard ISO 7498.
Generally, each message exchanged via the Data Link communication channel comprises operational data corresponding to a request or a response to a request intended for the pilot to pilot the aircraft.
Each exchanged message further comprises descriptive data in particular defining the type of the message. Thus, for example, it is conventional to distinguish messages of the Air Traffic Control (ATC) type, corresponding to messages related to air control, and messages of the Aeronautical Operational Control (AOC) type, corresponding to messages related to the operation of the aircraft.
All of the messages of a same type form one or more dialogues of the type. This dialogue thus comprises one or more requests and one or more responses to this or these request(s) exchanged between the ground station and the pilot of the aircraft.
A series of dialogues forms a dialogue sequence when the dialogues in that sequence are connected by a shared operational subject. “Operational subject” refers to a set of information relative to the state of the aircraft during an operating period and actions by the pilot exerted on the aircraft in that state and intended to achieve a same objective. Thus, the pieces of information relative to different flight phases of the aircraft, for example the takeoff phase or the landing phase, are considered operational subjects.
To carry out the Data Link communication, the aircraft generally includes a message acquisition capability of the “Data Link” type, a capability for displaying each text message as it is acquired, and a capability for storing acquired messages.
The storage capability, also referred to as “Logbook Data Link”, allows the pilot to consult text messages previously acquired when the operational data contained in those messages is needed.
However, it is not possible for the pilot to have an overview of all of the text messages acquired and stored in the storage capability so as to find one or more necessary messages therein quickly. One can then see that this involves a higher cognitive load for the pilot of the aircraft, thus decreasing flight safety.